Mike Wilkening

Share:

In horse racing, a win isn’t a win, that go-get-your-money win, until the race is declared official. And track stewards — racing’s rules officials — have the power to disqualify a winner if the horse was deemed to have won unfairly.

Such was the case in the 12th race Saturday at Gulfstream Park in Hallandale Beach, Florida, when a 15-to-1 shot named Collinito crossed the line first in a 1 1/16-mile turf race — then was disqualified and placed second for impeding the progress of the second-place finisher in the stretch.

Were this just the tale of a run-of-the-mill long shot booted out of first place, it would be just another bad beat story, and you have heard enough of those tales for several lifetimes.

Well, this one’s different. This defeat cost a bettor a jackpot of about $1.66 million, according to multiple published estimates.

If Collinito would have won the 12th, it would have triggered a payoff in Gulfstream’s “Rainbow 6” wager, a 20-cent minimum bet that pays out when just one ticket has the winners in six consecutive races designated by the track. If multiple tickets have six winners, or if no one picks six, 30 percent of the day’s Pick 6 wagers carry over to the next racing day, with the other 70 percent paid out in consolation tickets.

On Saturday, the Rainbow 6 encompassed Races 7-12, Race 12 being the day's finale at Gulfstream, which sits between Miami and Fort Lauderdale in South Florida. The race, run for a purse for $34,500, pitted 14 three-year-old maidens — horses who have yet to win. Moreover, it was a claiming race, which meant any of the entrants who made the gate could be purchased for $75,000.

In his career debut 33 days earlier, Collinito was 87-1, and he ran like it, finishing 11th, beaten by 13 lengths.

But on Saturday, Collinito, facing a weaker class of horses than in his debut, went right to the lead.

A half-mile into the race, Collinito had a 6.5-length lead, but by the top of the stretch, his lead had been cut to a length. He was tiring and drifted to his right, impeding — according to the stewards, at least — Strategic Keeper, a 39-to-1 shot. Collinito still led at the finish line, and Strategic Keeper settled for second, beaten by a neck after re-rallying and finding his best stride late.

Not long after, though, track announcer Larry Collmus announced the stewards would be conducting an inquiry to study the stretch battle between Collinito and Strategic Keeper. And ultimately, the stewards would take down Collinito, placing him behind Strategic Keeper, who had finished second in his last race as the favorite in a weaker field.

On Saturday, though, Strategic Keeper was off to the winner’s circle, and the horse racing world was atwitter about one of the more controversial stewards’ decisions in recent memory, given the stakes.

Writes The Daily Racing Form’s Andrew Beyer, “With so many players chasing a potential life-changing payoff, Gulfstream profits every day the jackpot remains in play. On Saturday, betting on the Rainbow 6 exceeded $550,000. The disqualification kept the jackpot alive – there were eight perfect tickets that included Strategy Keeper – and many horseplayers concluded this was the most sinister conspiracy since the Kennedy assassination. The blogosphere erupted with outrage.”

When racing resumes Wednesday at Gulfstream, the jackpot will begin with $1,474,750.31 in seed money. Horseplayers will again take their shots at raking a giant pot.

For the record, bettors who picked all six winners on Saturday received $36,659.22 for a 20-cent bet. So not everyone was unhappy about the DQ.

Such is life in horse racing. Your happiness is someone else’s misfortune. And when the “INQUIRY” sign flashes and you have a ticket with the apparent winner, there is nothing left to do but to await your fate.